The situation is not uncommon or difficult to imagine: A broken leg or a root canal causes pain beyond the remedy of an ice pack or physical therapy, and a medication is prescribed to help ease the throbbing, biting agony.
Quickly, however, the body becomes used to the aid and begins to need the substance.
Without it, the withdrawal can cause agony similar to what the pills were prescribed to combat.
That need is called dependence, and University Hospitals Geauga Medical Center Medical Director Dr. Lisa Brown, who grew up in Mayfield Heights, is spearheading a new service at the hospital in Chardon that will provide medical stabilization during the withdrawal process.
The service is in partnership with New Vision, a nationally recognized medical stabilization service, and is the first of its kind in the region, according to a University Hospitals news release. It will be available to people 18 and older and will accept most insurance, Medicaid and Medicare plans.
“What hurts is coming off of that substance or going cold turkey and not having it,” Brown said. “It’s not psychological, other than it hurts so much that I used to have patients using Suboxone (to detoxify), and they wanted it so badly so they’d obtain a pill and they’d lick it a little bit during the day and make it last as long as they could.”
The new service at the GMC will not use Suboxone or other products to ween patients off of a substance. The only medications used will be to combat symptoms of nausea.
It takes three to five days for the body to be rid of a substance to which they are dependent. During that time, Brown and the staff at the medical center will keep vital signs at equilibrium.
“This is a way for them to have a better chance at success of being substance-free because it is so painful,” she said. “It’s not going to kill you — you’re just going to wish you were dead.”
The medical center will provide stabilization for patients suffering withdrawal from prescription pills, heroin, alcohol, benzoates, cocain and other substances.
“(Voluntary) patients are going to be in-house in the hospital just like any patient would come in,” Brown said.
As many beds throughout the hospital as are needed will be available to detoxifying individuals. Those receiving the service will be in among patients being treated for any other medical issue. There will not be a new building or a specified floor.
Calling ahead and pre-screening will be required.
Brown said her main concern is where patients will go next.
“These patients are going to require the kind of special TLC with regard to emotions while they’re in house but most importantly when they leave. That’s going to be the critical time period,” she said.
There are rehabilitation facilities in the area — including a house opening soon in Mentor for women who are pregnant and/or have young children — that detoxified patients can move into. However, the waiting lists are long.
A stipulation of moving into such a house is being completely drug-free beforehand. That is why Brown and Geauga Medical Center President M. Steven Jones are embarking on this project, viewing it as a service to aid in the preparation of that more permanent commitment to sobriety.
“Typically what causes them to relapse is that it’s so uncomfortable to go through withdrawal with regard to heroin and narcotics,” Brown said. “It’s so uncomfortable that they typically cannot do it themselves.”
She said staff involved with the service will be committed to encouraging the correct next step in rehabilitation.
Pain is a condition difficult to endure and increasingly complicated to treat but the continued doling out highly-addictive drugs is not the answer, Brown said.
The overprescribing of pain medication is often pointed to as the root of an ever-growing national opioid addiction and dependency problem.
“Responsible prescribing is my mantra,” she said.
Brown is a member of the Geauga County Opiate Task force.
The medicine cabinet, she said, is the worst place to keep prescription pain medication. Family members, neighbor children and service professionals will know exactly where to find them if desired.
Heroin is a cheaper and more accessible drug to move to from prescription pain medication and even more addictive.
Brown described addiction — as opposed to dependence — as more psychological.
“The person will use that substance used for something other than it is intended, and they will perform reckless behaviors to obtain that substance,” she said.
That could mean stealing the drug itself or stealing money or merchandise to fund the next purchase.
But her experience in pain management is what qualified her for her active role in this new service.
“I went to Pennsylvania for all my training, and I came back when I graduated from my interventional pain fellowship,” Brown said.
Brown said Jones has always had a progressive view on the medical field.
“Maybe it’s because he comes from California,” she said.
“He says, ‘You know what? Just because we might not know about something and understand it, or just because it might make us feel uncomfortable doing doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t attempt it and attempt it in the right way.’”
For more information or to arrange a prescreening, call New Vision at 1-800-939-2273 or UH Geauga Medical Center at 440-285-2960.

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